The present invention relates to the field of telephony communications and more particularly to a system and method for determining a person""s telephone number from some other identifying information, such as their electronic mail address, screen name or login name.
Over the past few years, there has been an explosive increase in the use of the Internet for communication, data transfer, research and recreation. Businesses, educational institutions, individuals, and governments are beginning to use the Internet for everything from personal communication to mission-critical commercial negotiations and transactions. Indeed, electronic mail is developing into a preferred alternative to the telephone, conventional paper mail service and facsimile transmission as a means to communicate. Electronic mail or e-mail addresses, in particular, make it easy for individuals to communicate since typically these e-mail addresses include at least a portion of a party""s name thereby making these addresses much easier to remember as compared to conventional telephone numbers. Many people also like to use certain easy to remember online xe2x80x9cscreen namesxe2x80x9d or aliases which may reflect their interests, hobbies and/or beliefs. These xe2x80x9cscreen namesxe2x80x9d may be used in online chat rooms, discussion groups, instant messaging and newsgroups.
Unlike e-mail addresses, login names and screen names, conventional telephone numbers are not very easy to remember. A conventional telephone number is typically of the form XXX-YYY-YYYY where XXX designates the area code and YYY-YYYY designates the seven digit extension. While some phone numbers may actually xe2x80x9cspellxe2x80x9d a word or phrase when the numbers correspond to certain letters on a telephone keypad, for the most part, these telephone numbers are simply a collection of different unrelated numbers assigned to a called party by a telephone company or assigning authority. Furthermore, the recent increased usage of wireless phones and pagers has necessitated the creation of many new area codes has been necessitated, thereby even further making conventional telephone numbers difficult to remember.
Accordingly, it would be desirable to have an system which could provide the telephone number of an individual in response to their electronic mail address, screen name, login name or at lest a portion thereof.
The present invention is a system and method for assisting callers with obtaining another party""s telephone number when the caller only knows the other party""s online identifying information. This online identifying information may be an entire or at least a portion of the called party""s electronic mail address, screen name or login name. The method of the present invention includes the steps of receiving, from the calling party, the called party""s identifying information, the identifying information being at least a portion of the called party""s online identifying information, determining the called party""s telephone number from the online identifying information provided by the calling party and providing, to the calling party, the called party""s telephone number.
The system of the present invention includes a component for receiving the called party""s identifying information, wherein the called party""s identifying information is at least a portion of the called party""s online identifying information, a component for determining the called party""s telephone number from the called party online identifying information provided by the calling party and a component for providing the called party""s telephone number to the calling party. Additionally, a direct communication link may be established between the called party and the calling party, wherein the calling party may have access to the called party""s home telephone, work telephone or voicemail.
The present system includes one or more databases which associate a called party""s telephone number, with, for example, the called party""s electronic mail address. The one or more databases may be searched using the information provided by the calling party to determine the called party""s telephone number.